Railway rail



Patented Feb. 4, 1930 UNITED stares PATENT OFFICE I HENRY D. OLDENDORPH, or BELLEVILLE, ILLINOIS, Ann EDWIN G. OLDENDORPH, on

ST. LOUIS,

MISSOURI RAILWAY BAIL Application filed November 30, 1928. Serial No. 322,636.

Our invention relates to improvements in railway rails, and has for its object to provide a rail construction wherein the use of fish plates is dispensed with, and the rails are provided with self-contained locking means, whereby the rail-ends have tonguedand-grooved connection with each other, in combination with beveled ends of the flanges of the rails, affording large meeting faces for said flanges.

Advantages of our invention include the V ready assembling of the rails in place, and s the ready vertical removal of any rail for the purpose of replacement.

Another advantage of our constructlon re- I 7 sides in the distribution of outward stresses through the laminations formed in the meet-- ing ends of the rails, incidentally increasing the strength of the rails under such stresses and lessening the risk of. spreading or breaking, due to crystallization of the rail-ends.

Other advantages incident to the use of our invention will appear from the following description.

Drawings In the drawings V Fig. 1 is a topplan view of a rail, embodying this invention in place with fragments of the ends of the adjacent rails.

Fig. 2 is an enlarged top plan viewcof a rail embodying our invention, with a fragment of its central portion broken away.

Fig. 3-is a side elevation of the parts of the rail shown in Fig. 2.

Fig. 4: is an end elevationof the rail shown in Figs. 2 and 3. V s

Fig. 5 is a bottom plan view of one end of said rail. I

' 'Fig. 6 is a transverse vertical sectional view, taken on the line 66 of Fig. 1.

Description The embodiment of our invention illustrated in the drawings shows a rail A of I standard construction, its body being composed of the flange 7, web 8 and ball 9. Our

improvement relates to the ends of the rail A, the flange 7 being beveled asshown at 10, the web 8 and ball 9 being cut away, as

illustrated in Figs. 1 and 2, to form a pocket B for the meeting end of the adjacent rail.

The pocket B is composed of a longitudinal The construction thus described results in a formation of the outwardly projecting tongue 17, whose outer edge is curved downwardly and inwardly as shown at 18, so as to fit into the pocket B of the adjacent rail.

The tongues 17 are formed at opposite sides of the rail A as shown in Fig. 2. At

the locations where the pockets B are formed,

the outer face of the web 8 is provided with a thickening 19 of fish-plate contour formed integrally upon the surface of the web, as shown in section in Fig. 6, and in elevation in Fig. 3. The outer end of the tongues 17 is provided with a vertical notch 20, having the vertical beveled face 21, the plane of the face 21 being parallel with the beveled face 10 of the flange 7.

The rails thus described being assembled together as shown in Fig. 1, are secured together by means of bolts 22 which pass through the webs 8 at the thickened port-ion 19.

The bolts 22 pass through bores 23 at one side ofthe rail and elongated slots 24 at the opposite side of the rail, thus providing for the expansion and contraction of the rail A.

l/Vhen it is desired to replace one of the rails A, the bolts 22 are released, and the spikes 25 are removed from the ties 26, permitting the rail to be lifted vertically out of engagement with the meeting ends of the adjacent rails.

Any seeming structural weakness in our e5 rail-end construct-ion, we regard as being more than offset by the elimination or great reduction of the danger of wrecks due to transverse fissures or rail cancer; the laminations composing the rail-end structure being more readily tested than can the ordinary rail-ends. The strains of compression are converted into strains of tension, just as in the use of the ordinary rail. The resulting transverse fissures, which are formed in that zone of the metal which is put into a state of tension, can be readily detected proper inspection of our rail when in service;v furthermore, the laminated formation enables testing for defects in the milling processes to be more readily searched for and detected,

eitherbefore or after the rail is put into service, than can be done by the inspection'of rails of ordinary and thicker construction.

Furthermore, as determined by the Bureau of Safety of the Interstate Commerce Commission, the rail fissure occurs almost invariably on the side Where the Wheels-impinge and are caused. by the introduction of internal strains in the head of the rail set up by the action of the Wheel pressure on the running surface of the head. It becomes a matter of. importance then, to provide for the reversal of the railso that the rail may be readily reversed to present its opposite sides to the impinging Wheels; To that end, our construction is adapted to quick and accurate reversal, end for end, thus prolonging the life of the rail and tending .to avoid the accidents due to transverse fissure.

- Variousmodifications may be effected in the structure of the rail end Without departure from our actual invention, as defined in I bination With beveled ends of the base flanges of each of said units; the outer end of each of said tongues being provided With a-notc-h having a vertical bevel face, the plane of said bevel face being in alinement With the beveled faceofthe flange. V v

In testimony whereof We have hereunto affixed our signatures. v

HENRYD. OLDENDOBPHp EDWIN G. OLDENDORPH. 

